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About this blog: I am a native of Alameda County, grew up in Pleasanton and currently live in the house I grew up in that is more than 100 years old. I spent 39 years in the daily newspaper business and wrote a column for more than 25 years in add... (More)

About this blog: I am a native of Alameda County, grew up in Pleasanton and currently live in the house I grew up in that is more than 100 years old. I spent 39 years in the daily newspaper business and wrote a column for more than 25 years in addition to writing editorials for more than 15 years. I have served as a director of many non-profits in the Valley and the broader Bay Area and currently serve as chair of Teen Esteem and on the advisory board of Shepherd?s Gate. I also served as founding chair of Heart for Africa and have travelled to Africa seven times to serve on mission trips. My wife, Betty Gail, has taught at Amador Valley High (from where we both graduated) since 1981. She and I both graduated from the University of California, Berkeley, as did both of my parents and my three siblings. Given that Cal tradition, our daughter went south to the University of Southern California and graduated with a degree in international relations. Since graduation, she has taken three mission trips and will be serving in the Philippines for nine months starting in September. (Hide)

Families making $117k qualify for subsidized housing

Uploaded: Jun 26, 2018

The headline in the East Bay Times was stunning: “Low income is the Bay Area is $117,400.”
That’s the updated number from the federal Dept. of Housing and Urban Development. It’s been driven by soaring rents and housing prices to say nothing of other price points. Have you noticed how much cheaper gasoline is in Tracy than Pleasanton?
A second front page story by CalMatters reported the economic challenges faced by college students from poorer families. Vanessa Rancano reported that median rent statewide had climbed about 44 percent in a decade and that number is much higher in the Bay Area where a shortage of new units has seen both for-sale housing prices and rental rates skyrocket.
These headlines help focus on the East Bay Economic Development Alliance’s annual outlook report prepared by Beacon Economics and its principal Chris Thornberg. He’s optimistic about economic growth in 2018, but warns that the current expansion at nine years is among the longest on record—the same caution that Gov. Jerry Brown has issued with his budgets for the last three years. Expansion cannot go on forever.
For this year, Beacon expects job growth to continue and the unemployment rate to continue to decline in the East Bay. He also cautions about the lack of housing where the new home construction is still lagging historical averages that coupled with low inventory of for-sale homes continues to drive up prices.
For the Bay Area, employment in 2017 grew 1.9 percent—a rate that continues to outpace the national growth.
Wonder why roads are congested: about one-third of East Bay (Alameda and Contra Costa residents) leave the county to work in the South Bay or San Francisco. Mix in the Solano and San Joaquin County commuters and you understand why I-680 is a parking lot many mornings.
More good news: taxable sales in the East Bay grew nicely in 2017 reaching a new record of $48.9 billion as did venture capital investment that hit $2.4 billion last year. Commercial real estate vacancy rates remain near post-recession lows, while rents are climbing. Interestingly, the vacancy rate for retail, which is struggling nationally, stood at just 6.6 percent, while office was at 14.1 percent. Warehouse, a bullish category, hit a low of 6.7 percent.
The challenge is that housing, with the relatively affordable East Bay prices versus the South Bay, the Peninsula or San Francisco, prices soared at double-digit rates.
With very low unemployment rates, Beacon predicts continued economic expansion for the East Bay.

Posted by Doug Miller,
a resident of Country Fair,
on Jun 26, 2018 at 2:19 pmDoug Miller is a registered user.

As Tim writes, our highways are parking lots, in part, because of the "no growth" people. We restrict large tracts of land from development which drives up the value of unrestricted land. We charge developers additional fees to build a lot of infrastructure that may not be necessary. This drives up the cost of new construction. Then the state tells us that some arbitrary portion of new construction must be "affordable" further driving up the cost of housing that is sold at market prices.

With these increased costs for land and construction, only those with higher incomes can afford to live here. Which leads to the I680 and I580 parking lots as people drive to where they can afford to live.

I have often thought that those sound walls along the freeways were really constructed by the no growth crowd to keep to keep people out of Pleasanton.

Posted by vefamosu,
a resident of Danville,
on Jun 30, 2018 at 3:57 pm

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a resident of Carlton Oaks,
on Jul 14, 2018 at 2:56 am

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a resident of Apperson Ridge,
on Sep 18, 2018 at 2:20 am

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